


Child Of Night

by calatheil



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Infinity Gauntlet, Loki is a cutie, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Queer Themes, Science Fiction & Fantasy, Thanos meets his match
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-30
Updated: 2018-04-30
Packaged: 2019-04-30 08:53:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14493342
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/calatheil/pseuds/calatheil
Summary: Born to a powerful king, her life has never been easy.Forced into a marriage at a young age to an Asgardian prince, she never believed she would care for him. While Loki has always sworn his love to her, she ran from her own feelings.But as catastrophe strikes, she realises what she would do to protect him, even if it means ripping apart the universe as it is known to save him.  Rising out of the shadows into the light, she is the universes best hope, but perhaps also its downfall.Infinity war rewrite (Kinda) because I didn't like the way it turned out.





	1. Chapter 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I'm using an old character from another work I've done, I'm bad I know but I love her. She's from an original novel I'm writing as are all non-marvel characters in my work so as a disclaimer I do not own any Marvel character, but any characters that are O/C based are mine and owned by me! That being said I hope enjoy! Leave a comment if you can, its most appreciated and helps me develop as a writer or just know the work was loved (or hated!)

It is often in the moments after a disaster that the world holds its breath. In the vast expanse of chaos and destruction, it seemed that even time had stopped. Eruanna, daughter of king Cerian, crowned heir of the Narian empire, stood alone. High up on the battlements of her father’s palace she watched the sky darken, the sky flickering with fire.  Her pale face was set in a grim line as her red catlike eyes bore witness to a destruction far off. The wind around her whipped up her unkept hair and she breathed it in slowly, her hand tightening on the blade in her hand as a feeling of unease fell upon her. Beside her, her lieutenant and long-time friend, Carlis, also looked to the sky, her one good eye scanning quickly for any source of threat.

“What do you think it is?” Carlis murmured, glancing over at her.

“Trouble,” Eruanna answered coolly, “Have our armies readied for an attack, double the enchantments and raise the defences.”

Carlis nodded slowly, “What are you going to do?”

“I’m going to have a world with our friend Thanos,” Eruanna said, “he’s out of line and I’ll make sure he gets back into his proper place beneath the heel of my boot.”

“What if he refuses?”

“Then I’ll kill him. And then I’ll kill his children as a warning to others not to cross me,” Eruanna replied, holding up a glittering dagger to the light.

“What about Loki, could he help?” Carlis suggested tentatively, “I know you have a history but perhaps you could put that to use?”

 Eruanna sighed and folded her arms across her chest, pausing to think.

“If I thought my husband could be of help, he would already be here, but as it stands, its complicated.”

“You still love him, you don’t want him getting hurt by Thanos again. That’s not complicated,” Carlis said, a soft smile forming across her lips.

“It’s not funny Carlis.”

“No, it’s is, after centuries of him professing his love to you and you ignoring him, you cannot bare to see him harmed, I never thought I’d see the day, you finally went soft.”

“I could throw you off this tower,” Eruanna warned, narrowing her eyes at her friend.

“It wouldn’t kill me, and you know it.”

“No but it would hurt. We might be immortal, but we aren’t immune to everything.” Eruanna reminded, “Perhaps the fifty thousand years you have lived have made you forgetful.”

Carlis snorted and shook her head, “You should go before something comes up.”

“Right, would you be so kind as to open up a porthole for me?”

“Can’t you do it yourself?”

“What’s the fun in having people to order around if you end up doing it all yourself? Eruanna asked, “Besides, time and space manipulation really, not my thing.”

Carlis sighed and raised her hand, her eyes turning from deep red to bright silver. A large pool of blackness appeared in the space opposite the pair.

“Don’t look so concerned,” Eruanna said, “Our people are some of the most powerful creatures in creation, they will survive without me for a while.”

“I’m not worried for them,” Carlis replied, gripping Eruanna’s forearm in traditional salute. Eruanna grinned and winked at her, stepping away from her.

“Thanos fears me, I mean who can blame him? I’m the daughter of the most powerful being ever to live, worry about people who need it Carlis, I’ll kick his ass.”

The elder naira grunted and Eruanna turned away, taking a deep breath she plunged herself through the porthole.

***

Starlight mingled with blackness. The dark she wanted through was thick, hands clawed up from the ink, but she knew to keep moving, to focus on where she needed to go. To falter was to lose one’s self to the silence. Eruanna moved like a ghost through the void, an ancient magic clinging to her as she moved, forcing the dark to retreat backwards. A soft light glowed in the distance and she moved towards it, stepping out onto a large passage leading up to a stone seat.

For a moment, she saw death all around her. She paused, _h_ _er eyes mirroring a timeless sorrow and recognition of the mortality of other creatures that she could never experience. The world around her moving in a current she could swim in. Eruanna called her powers, willing the mirage to leave her. It crumbled slowly, revealing a giant figure standing at the opposite end of the room._

“Beautiful isn’t it?” Thanos’s voice boomed out across the space, “The balance of life and death, mine to control with a snap of my fingers.”

 “Why not let them devour one another, they are a breath in the life of the universe, why bother with the rats that fight one another when there are far greater things?” Eruanna answered softly, moving slowly towards him, her hand tightly holding her blade that was strapped to her waist. “Sooner or later they will destroy themselves. If you believe you are above them, why concern yourself?”

“Because it is my destiny,” Thanos rumbled, “to fix the universe.”

Eruanna rolled her eyes and stood beside him, watching fires burn on a planet below. Thanos said nothing but stood, studying her, waiting.

“And what if I said your destiny is becoming a nuisance that my people will not allow? What then, your glove holds no sway over us, we were here before the universe, we witnessed its creation, each and every living thing exists to serve us, they are all cogs in a greater machine that has yet to be revealed.”

“I would say you have listened to too many of your father’s stories,” Thanos answered softly, settling himself into his chair. “The Asgardians believed themselves to be gods, but they bled like all the rest.”

Eruanna froze. A soft hiss running through her teeth as she turned slowly to face him, her eyes narrowing as she drew her blade. Thanos drew in a long breath, his hand curling tightly around the gauntlet as he pressed himself further into his chair and away from her.

“I told you to leave them out of this” Eruanna snarled, “You gave your word they wouldn’t be harmed.”

Thanos smiled, “So it’s true, you care for him? It will give you then to know he is gone. I can’t say he died honourably, whimpering in my hand. _Pathetic.”_

A knot twisted in her stomach and she grit her teeth, holding her blade to his neck. “I’ll kill you.”

Thanos rose to his gigantic height towering above her. Unflinchingly she met his gaze as he raised his fist, one arm adorned with a gauntlet, “You think I fear you now that I have this, Eruanna?”

 

“You should,” Eruanna growled, “That will no more harm me than a bird could harm a deep-sea creature; even with that, I’m still more powerful than you.  I was willing to let you have your fun, but oath breaker, your time is up.”

 

Thanos pulled his fist back and she screeched, fury boiling over as she lunged at him. The tian released his fist, but his attack met thin air as Eruanna’s body turned to black smoke and hurled up around the room slamming into him from behind, sending him backwards through the wall of the room. She advanced, tendrils of smoke clinging to her as her eyes glowed, her whole body throbbing and buzzing with power as she launched a ball of energy with ease in the struggling titan. It burned a hole in his chest and he screamed out. A smile played across her lips as she stood over him, blade glimmering like the teeth of hungry wolves, waiting for a meal.

A soft laugh poured from Thanos’s lips and he sat up. The whole room shifted and changed about her into a black space, filled with death. All across the spaceships floor blood pooled as piles of bodies lay, glassy eyes looking to the sky. Eruanna moved slowly, her eyes searching. Holding her breath as she neared a window she saw him. His body twisted and broken. 

Loki’s eyes gazed up at her, his face ashen and cold. Eruanna let out a scream and sank to her knees, all around her the metal of the ship beginning to twist and groan. She knelt, her fingers reaching for him, dusting a stand of hair away from his face as a tear escaped her eye. Taking a deep breath, she looked up. Thanos stood over her smiling gleefully down upon her. Eruanna staggered to her feet, fighting back the rage and grief.

“This isn’t real,” She murmured, “This is another trick, you always where a coward Thanos.”

“Its real princess, he’s left you all alone…” Thanos answered smugly. Eruanna shook her head and laughed bitterly.

“Death can be rewritten, nothing is set in stone, not while I live…” She replied, meeting his gaze with a firm defiance, “I would have let you continue this crusade of yours Thanos, but now, I’ll take everything from you.”

She moved forward, the smile on Thanos’s lips faltering as her hand became flame. She took aim. With a yell she freed the fire from her palm. It sailed through the air, hitting the cool steel wall where Thanos had stood.

 Eruanna’s eyes watched the fire smoulder on the wall, struggling to comprehend how she had lost him. Freezing her heart to the rage and confusion, she pulled a map from the pouch strapped to her waist and pulled the ring from her finger whispering an enchantment as she dropped the gold band onto the parchment. The ring moved across the page, circling an area nearest the top corner. Smiling with satisfaction she studied the objects back in the punch and summoned a porthole.

“I’m coming Loki, hang in there…”


	2. Chapter 2

Staring across the devastation that was before her. Her feet, though firmly planted in the wrecked scrap of a spaceship could not bring themselves to move forward, so she stood, searching the floating corpses for any sign of life through expanse. With every creak of twisting metal, she reached for the sword, her eyes avoiding looking to the furthest end of the ship.  The sick feeling was back in the pit of her stomach and for a moment she considered leaving. A voice deep within her screamed at her to run but she ignored it, stooping to examine each body, checking for life. It wasn’t long before she came upon faces she knew and she stopped. Heimdall lay dead, a spear having torn apart his ribcage. Slowly she reached over and closed his eyes.

“Be at peace, Asgardian.” She murmured, getting to her feet slowly. Squaring her shoulder’s, she moved on, her feet leading her to the place she knew he lay. This time she was ready, and she crouched beside him, a saddened smile playing across her face. Carefully, she leant over him and placed a kiss on his forehead, closing her eyes to hold back a flood of tears. She sat beside him, cradling him in her arms, singing softly as she had done when he had been sick. Memories flooding back to her as she held his broken body close to her heart.

_“Why must you go?”_

_“My people need me Loki”_

_“But I need you too… stay.”_

_“I can’t.”_

_“I thought you loved me?”_

_“I have to go.”_

Eruanna gazed out across the blacked space beyond the window, looking down at him once again. A tempest of emotions swirling about her insides as she sat still.

“You damned fool Loki” she hissed, “you goddamn selfish fool.”

Taking another deep breath, she closed her eyes, her whole body trembling as her mind searched desperately for answers. _Death can be rewritten. This is only temporary if you will it to be._ Eruanna tried to ignore the thought but a long forgotten conversation came to mind and she began to think it over.

_“So, what can you do then?”_

_“Many things, but Papa says that I’m not allowed to use most of my powers,”_

_“But what good is that, having powers that you can’t use?”_

_“Father said that I could upset the universal balance if I use certain abilities…”_

_“And? If you have powers the universe wants you to use them, Eruanna, you never take orders from anyone anyway, so the way I see it is, you should do what you want, not what you are told.”_

Eruanna looked down at her husband and then back out to the window, the stars glittered like thousands of crystals in a careless night. Her heart felt empty. _What good is all this power if it cannot be used?_ Gently she laid him back on the floor and smiled grimly, her mind made up. Thanos had shown he willing to destroy to fulfil his desires. _In war, there is only what you must do not what is right._ Her father’s words came back to her as she leant over him, pressing her lips to his she breathed into his lungs.

Getting to her feet she dug around in the rubble and found a small bowl. Cutting a small lock of her hair, she placed it in the bowl and repeated it with Loki’s hair. Tying the two locks of hair together, she carved open her palm, painting a circle around them in her blood before spilling some over the locks of hair. From a pouch on her belt, she pulled out a variety of crystals and herbs, grinding them into dust before adding them to the mix alongside a small vial of pure light. Hurriedly she forced Loki’s mouth open and poured the mixture down his throat before holding her hands over his chest.

“Time to wake up Loki.”

Slowly her skin began to glow gold, her eyes growing black as the room around her darkened. Coils of darkness slithered into the cracks, smothering light so only the circle remained. Softly she began to whisper enchantments in an ancient tongue, her magic flowing through her as the world around her hissed and warped.  Eruanna’s eyes remained fixed on Loki as the cast the spell. The words fell quickly from her mouth, her breathing slow and rhythmic. Speaking the last line, she lent and kissed him.

Sitting back up, Eruanna studied his face. There was no twitch nor sign of life. No breath held within his body. For a moment she wanted to scream at him, but she was tired and empty. Bowing her head she remained still, tears finally falling in beads down her face as she gave in to sorrow.

“You know…” a soft voice said, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you cry before.”

Snapping her head back up she looked across at Loki. He lay, one eye open a small flicker of a smile playing over his face. Slowly, and with considerable effort he sat up, wincing with each movement. Eruanna wiped away the tears on her sleeve and scowled at him

“If you want to remain alive, you’ll say nothing,”

“Would I do that?” Loki murmured, his nose beginning to wrinkle as his taste returned, “What did you make me drink? Its revolting. What happened, was I dead? Did you bring me back? Why?”

Eruanna sighed, rolling her eyes at the tirade of questions and tried to think of a clever reason to give him but couldn’t. Shrugging she scrambled to her feet and held out her hand to help him up. With some effort, Loki managed it, groaning as every muscle fought against the movement.

“You haven’t answered my question,” Loki continued, his eyes glimmering in the half light as he studied her face.

“I may be somewhat attached to you,” Eruanna answered, avoiding his gaze, her feelings still swirling from events

“Well, I don’t blame you-” Loki said grinning, “I am after all the more desirable brother, no?”

“Don’t get cocky, I could leave you here.”

“Not up for a conversation then,” Loki retorted, his smile fading somewhat, “We do however still need to talk about what happened in New York.”

“Nothing happened Loki, you chose to leave for a while, you said you didn’t want me around, you wanted to destroy humanity, so I respected that choice, as for being married, it’s a minor complication,” Eruanna answered, beginning to make her way to a surviving corridor. Her skin slowly crawling with irritation.

“And since when did you respect anyone’s choices? I mean for all you know, I could have wanted to remain deceased.”

“Well I can kill you just as easily as I brought you back,” Eruanna threatened, turning away and doubling her pace.

“Eruanna wait,” Loki called out, “just stop, for one moment... I haven’t seen you in years, I died, or at least I think I was dead. The first thing I see when I wake up is you.  You left after New York to be with your people, why come back for me now?”

Eruanna groaned softly and paused, biting the inside of her cheek thoughtfully as Loki waited, his brow furrowed as his eyes searched her face for any sign of an answer. A small impulse began to take a hold of her and dance impishly about her head.  Slowly she made her way back over to him, stepping over a dismembered arm. Reaching him she stopped and without a second thought, she leaned in and placed a quick kiss on his cheek, moving to gift another to his lips. For a moment, it felt like the most natural thing in the universe. Then, she remembered everything that had past and she pulled away. Loki moved to pull her in and she wriggled free of his arms and wiped her mouth on the back of her sleeve looking sheepish.

“I’m sorry… I don’t, that was a mistake” she mumbled, dodging his gaze, instantly regretting toying with him. Loki drew out a long breath and nodded, his face already lined with a familiar frustration that had been too common in their relationship.

“After everything that’s happened, a kiss? And then you say you made a mistake?”

Loki’s face was lined with confusion, behind his eyes bubbled darker emotions that Eruanna had no desire sitting further but she was tired, her patience wearing thin. She wanted nothing more to leave the collapsing vessel and return home to safety and comfort, but the god of mischief was being for more a problem than she remembered him being in the past.

“You left me alone on Asguard, Loki,” Eruanna reminded him, “A naira, alone, on a planet of people who despise my kind. Your brother protected me out of love for you, but I was alone. It’s more than you deserve… I’m just happy you are alive.”

“That’s not answering my question. You saved me. Why?” Loki demanded, folding his arms across his chest, his tone becoming harsh, evidently growing tired of her dodging him.

“You know why,” Eruanna snapped stepping further away from him, “I’m not going to answer something you already know. If you don’t know the answer, you’re smart enough to figure it out.”

“I want to hear you say it for once,” Loki answered, “I know you didn’t choose to be with me but here you are. Why can’t you just admit that you love me?”

“Because then it would be real,” Eruanna growled, her eyes beginning to glow as her temper bubbled, “I brought you back because I care for you, but don’t ever make me say those words. I married you because I had to.  You were kind enough to me and for that I am thankful, but I cannot say that I love you, it is not in my nature.”

“You just said it,” Loki quipped, a slight mischievous smile playing across his pale face.

“Don’t steal my words out of context, I’m not in the mood.”

Loki raised his hands up in mock surrender but continued to smile.

“I’ve missed you Eruanna.”

Eruanna turned away and felt her smile falter, her eyes fixing on the stars in front of them. They seemed dimmer than before, blinking slowly the air seeming to thicken as though rotting.

“Don’t get too comfortable…” Eruanna mumbled, feeling her face heat up as his charming smile burrowed past her defences, “My father might behead me yet.”

“What did you do?” Loki said, his eyes following hers as the stars faded in and out of existence.

“I tipped the universal scales…” Eruanna murmured, “you remember that magic I said was forbidden, and you told me I usually ignore the rules? I ignored the rules.”

“What do we do?”

“We don’t do anything… I need to find the person who killed you and end them: balance restored.”

Loki said nothing. Instead his eyes slowly began to drift over the piles of bodies lining the ship, his face unreadable. Gingerly she reached out to comfort him but thought better of it and pulled her hand away, instead beginning to make her way to where she had left the porthole. Just before the opening she stopped and looked back. Loki still stood, frozen as though part of the ship itself staring across the devastation. Eruanna groaned softly under her breath then taking a few steps away from the dark gate, she caught his attention.

“Loki, their dead, come on, leave them.”

Slowly, as though being dragged by an unseen force, Loki moved over to her. Gently she took him by the arm and pulled him away from the metal graveyard and out through the porthole into shining sunlight.

 

 


End file.
